[Editor’s Note: The Peace Studies program, started at
Manchester College in 1948 under the leadership of Dr. Gladdys Muir, was the
first of more than 200 programs now being offered by college and universities
worldwide.]

Dr. Gladdys Muir came to Manchester College because
President Vernon F. Schwalm had the vision to invite her to carry out her dream
of Brethren colleges training leadership for peace. Her 1947 essay, “The Place
of Brethren College in Preparing Men and Women for Peace Leadership,” was
addressed to all the presidents of the six Brethren colleges. It would be a joy
to Dr. Muir that now, nearly 45 years later, each of the Brethren colleges and
Bethany Seminary have some type of academic program in peace studies. But Dr.
Muir was the pioneer at Manchester.

Dr. Muir was primarily a teacher and scholar. She was also
the living embodiment of her concerns. Her impact on students, colleagues, and
townspeople was the result of what she was as a person.

She was a deeply religious person. Each week for most of
her years at Manchester she held a quiet hour, when students, colleagues, and
neighbors were invited to join her in meditation. While I was in college from
1949-1953, this Quaker-like silent meeting was held in the Calvin Ulrey room on
the second floor of the old Library (now Communications Center), which also
served as her office. It was rumored outside the college that these meetings
included yoga exercises and eastern mysticism. The rumors were unfounded to the
best of my knowledge. But participants were free to share whatever insight or
concern was on their heart.

There was also a weekly peace cell group in which Dr. Muir,
the Don Royers, the Earl Garvers, and a number of students participated. Because
there was a considerable range of theological opinion represented, many of the
books and pamphlets we studied in the cell were religious in focus. Dr. Muir was
always deeply interested in the roots of peace and social concern. She repeated
often Elton Trueblood’s assertion that ours was a “cut-flower civilization”
severed from its religious and cultural roots. She saw these roots primarily in
people’s personal spiritual lives and the community of faith. Dr. Muir and her
mother were in church each Sunday, and she often led church related classes at
Walnut Street Church of the Brethren and on campus in the College Church School
program. Still, her private devotional life was the richest source of her
personal faith and vitality.

For those who knew her well, it was quite evident that
everything she taught and shared was rooted in her own spiritual life. Her
lifelong quest originated in the study of the life and teaching of Jesus. Her
favorite Biblical teachings were summarized in the Sermon on the Mount. Her
course on “Principles and Procedures in Peacemaking” began with a study of the
Biblical sources of peace concern and spent several weeks on the life and
witness of Jesus as focused in the Sermon on the Mount.

Dr. Muir was deeply influenced by Quakerism. She saw in it
a combination of spiritual questing and social/political activism. John
Woolman’s Journal combined the two
elements in his lifelong questing toward spiritual and material simplicity and
his campaigns to convince his fellow Quakers and others to renounce slavery and
voluntarily free their slaves. It was this sort of appeal to individual
conscience and personal spiritual growth that was over and over again stressed
in readings assigned and analyses offered. George Fox and William Penn, as well
as modern Quakers, such as Rufus Jones, Douglas Steere, and Elton Trueblood,
were key readings in her various course syllabi. She was chided by some as being
more Quaker than Christ-centered in her faith. As always when she was challenged
publicly, she would grow very quiet and reflective. After a moment’s evaluation
of the issue, she would respond, “The Inner Light is the spirit of the Living
Christ within. To listen to the voice of God within is to be Christ-centered.”

These beliefs led her to examine the spiritual and
intellectual quests of non-Christian faiths. Her sources for peacemaking always
included world spiritual classics, such as the Bhagavad Gita, the Tao Te Ching,
Plato’s Apology for Socrates, and the Greek tragedies. For Gladdys Muir the
religious and philosophical quests of all human kind led to peace and could
provide the foundations for “many mansions” in the coming city of God, which is
humanity’s true home. No one could know Gladdys Muir well, or be in her company
long, without discovering the profound respect she had for the treasures of
spirituality and community, as well as political/social/moral insights that
originated both within and outside the western democratic and religious
traditions.

Gladdys Muir was a remarkably thoughtful person. Not only
in terms of the ideas which sparkled behind her quiet, unobtrusive exterior, but
in the many personal kindnesses she showed was Dr. Muir remarkable. Many
received gifts of books and Christmas cards, handlettered and illuminated
beautifully in her own calligraphy. The messages were aptly chosen for the
particular recipients. Her students were invited for weekly afternoon teas in
her home, where art and music were often the focus of interest. Dr. Muir was at
times prevailed upon to play the piano. She did so reluctantly but beautifully
in the same gentle touch evident in her sketches and paintings. From her father
she had gained a love of art and music, and perhaps as well learned and polished
her considerable talent. At times art books and reproductions prominently
displayed in her home were conversation starters.

Ever the gracious hostess, even in her seminars, which were
by invitation only, she provided a setting where there was a freedom to raise
any issue or question and to express any opinion. But it was also quite evident
when she did not agree, though she rarely directly contradicted or argued a
point. Her sparkling eyes gave encouragement to ideas shared and convictions
revealed. Only occasionally did the body language of averted eyes and reflective
silence indicate dissent from an opinion or conclusion.

As a teacher in the upper level classes I took from her,
Dr. Muir rarely lectured. At times she would present a situation or problem or
perspective in a 10 to 20-minute summary, but then she would turn to her
question cards over key points in the assigned readings. If you had not read,
you needed to be prepared to be embarrassed in class. While she often allowed
volunteers to respond, she persisted in questioning those who did not volunteer.
Facts were important, but approaches, interpretive slants, points of view,
analyses of issues, and summaries and comparison were the focus of each class.
It was the ultimate demonstration of the Socratic method, of dialogue, and the
truth that “teaching is not simply telling.” The excitement of Dr. Muir’s
classes (nearly all the outstanding students from whatever field were attracted
to them) was not based on a theatrical performance. It was based on the
excitement of the ideas themselves and the vast horizons opened by them as
together the class and Dr. Muir explored their implications.

Dr. Muir was a genius in helping her students to think, to
articulate and evaluate ideas and proposals. Some felt her style and loading of
the course readings amounted to a subtle indoctrination. Both at Manchester and
at Bethany Seminary, her students ran into that assessment of Dr. Muir’s work.
Certainly many of us were deeply influenced by her ideas and perspectives.
However, it is a mistake to assume that there was (or is) uniformity of opinion
and point of view among her former students and majors. Her students included
argumentative and dissenting learners. Much of the argumentation went on long
after class was dismissed.

Dr. Muir taught, to many of us for the first time, how to
read reflectively and critically, not just for data but for conclusions, ideas
for practical application to social, political, and moral problems. A remarkably
high number of her majors and former students went on to graduate study. Many
earned doctorates and other professional degrees in a wide variety of fields,
attesting to the effectiveness and inspiration of her teaching, along with that
of many other Manchester faculty.
It was part of the excitement of Manchester’s faculty in those days that there
were many clear and open disagreements among our teachers. These differences
were usually respectfully but also forcefully presented.

Dr. Muir was not only a teacher in the narrower sense, she
was also a mentor. Throughout her academic career, the large amount of personal
advising she carried on was largely non-directive but supportive of ambitions
and goals, plans and programs that seemed beyond the reach or present capacities
of those who sought her counsel. Not all of her students were able or
disciplined, yet she found positive elements and possibilities in their dreams.
She believed ordinary people can do extraordinary things. Motivation, hard work,
sustained concentration on a goal can overcome limitations. She helped turn D
students into C and B students, and students with little self-confidence into
effective, self-possessed mature adults. As my wife reminded me, she also gave A
students C’s, if they were not working up to their ability. I was one such in my
first two classes with her. She also helped students who had always made good
grades see the value of their study itself and the insights to be gained by
sustained reading and reflection.

Dr. Muir always stressed that you could be a peacemaker
through many vocations and with quite different personal styles. While she
modeled a very non-aggressive, non-belligerent approach, she recognized, and her
students often represented, a very diverse set of approaches. While some made
inner transformation and creation of small of like-mindedness (the Bruderhof
communitarian movement claimed many whom she inspired), many others chose
political and social activism, public health, relief and rehabilitation,
administrative and church vocations. The largest number chose teaching and
ministry as their avenues of peacemaking.

Gladdys Muir was a person of broad interests and wide range
of competencies. This is obvious from what has already been said of her
teaching, artistic, and musical talents. She was originally a teacher of Latin
and Spanish. Greek classics and the history of the ancient world were favorite
subjects in her teaching. Among the materials she taught with the most
enthusiasm were the plays of the Greek tragic poets, the
Odyssey and the
Iliad of Homer, and Plato’s
Republic and
Apology for the life of Socrates.
Her course on “Foundations of Democracy” featured the Athens of Pericles and its
assembly of free citizens, as well as the struggle between the Roman Senate and
the emerging power of the generals turned emperors and autocrats. The ancient
world came to life and relevance in her classes. Each year at Manchester her
reading course in intellectual history would perform one of the classical Greek
tragedies. In her world civilization classes and various peace studies courses,
the Peloponnesian Wars served as illustrations of the recurrent economic and
political breakdowns of agreements among ancient city states and modern nations.
She pointed out the parallels in the economic competition and mercantile
imperialism which repeatedly led to wars, and the breakdown of world order.

For Dr. Muir explanations of historical events were never
simply economic, or political, or sociological. ‘They were all of these, plus
the influences of broadly cultural ideas and values. Spiritual movements were
shown to have their impact on the total life and developments of the time. Nor
were local or regional events treated in isolation from their broader contexts.
Her approach was always holistic and global to the extent that data warranted
wider vistas of interpretation.

Narrow specialists and persons jealous of her breadth and
popularity among the more serious students of various disciplines were often
critical of her approaches and sometimes quarreled with her conclusions, as well
as what they considered her biases. But she never, to my knowledge, retaliated
in kind by discussing their limitations or being defensive about her own views.
She seemed supremely confident in her grasp of the big issues and of the ideas
of great thinkers. Like Confucius in ancient China, she saw herself as merely
passing on the wisdom of the past and helping others try to apply it to the
present. Problems of war and peace deserve the best thinking and deepest
spiritual/philosophical insights any can bring. We do not have to agree, Dr.
Muir concluded. We do have to grapple with the issues that dominated the 1940s
to the 1960s and still dominate today.

She called on our reading of Tolstoy to challenge notions
of wealthy people doing little for the poor, “on whose backs we ride,” as he
said. In War and Peace and in the
century later Dr. Zhivago her
students saw how tragic is war and how irrational and arbitrary are its course,
impact, and devastation. How wasteful and cruel is war and how destructive to
both human lives and the environment were repeated concerns in her classes.
Critiques of imperialism, colonialism, as well as the need for Third World
development and aid were topics for learning lessons from the past and seeking
solutions for the present and future.

The United Nations was, to her mind, the great hope for
human organization and eventually world government to curb war, settle disputes,
and provide aid for refugees, victims of hunger and natural calamities.
Successful negotiations by the U.N. to settle the Arab-Israeli War in 1948 were
examined carefully for the various factors which allowed for an end to the
fighting. She was never quite satisfied with the failure to care for Palestinian
repatriation or the integration of Arab refugees into their host countries. She
foresaw the bitterness and resentment on all sides without a settlement just to
all would continue to cause problems.

Gandhi and the tradition of non-violent civil disobedience
were central to her vision of how unjust laws and international arrangements
could be made right. The writings of Thoreau and Kagawa filled out various
aspects of social and political change that could be wrought by conscientious
resistance to injustice, oppression, poverty, and unconcern for the powerless
and dispossessed. Reading about their lives, approaches, and theories of
non-violence provided concrete models for social change and resistance to war
and structural violence of unjust systems.

William James’s “moral equivalents of war,” encouraging
redirection of our struggles with enemies to focus on overcoming ignorance,
poverty, narrowness of concern, were presented as substitutes for humankind’s
combativeness and hostility. The true enemy is all that blights and plagues
human life. If people or systems cause the human tragedies, we should seek to
change the oppressors and oppressive systems by persuasion where possible or by
the force of direct confrontation, public opinion, appeal to conscience, and
civil disobedience, general strikes, and non-cooperation.

Dr. Muir was an astute analyst of the causes of war in
political and economic terms. The origins of World Wars I and II and of the
Korean “Police Action” were examined closely. She sought always to understand
what did happen but also to suggest how alternative diplomatic or policy stances
might have prevented these wars. While she believed there were always
alternatives to violence, she did not believe that utopias would come or that
human tragedies could always be averted.

She carefully analyzed why the League of Nations failed,
and she cautiously suggested that the United Nations had overcome some of the
League’s flaws but was in great difficulty whenever the great powers could not
agree or cooperate in seeking solutions. The Cold War was a great tragedy in her
mind, as was the McCarthy Era, which prevented a fair or accurate assessment of
world communism or Russian nationalism as threats. The nuclear arms race and our
use of atomic weapons had poisoned the atmosphere of trust so essential to the
emergence of a peaceful world. She would have been amazed as all of us are at
the end of the Cold War and the way Eastern European socialism and communism
seem on the brink of self-destruction.

It would be fascinating to hear her analysis of what has
happened and what is likely to follow. Her own predilections to Wilsonian
idealism and faith in the possibilities of self-determination and
self-government would have made the opportunities of today’s world exciting
indeed for her. She was proud of America for the Marshall Plan helping to
rebuild Europe. She supported massive aid for the world’s poorer nations and
would likely approve of a similar investment in Eastern Europe today. She would
be happy that much of the developed world now surpasses U.S. contributions but
sad that most of the aid is still based on political and economic
quid pro quo beliefs and goals of the
givers.

Ultimately Gladdys Muir’s impact on North Manchester was
made in the influence which she had on Manchester College and a generation of
faculty and students who learned to know her well. One could not know her and
see her earnest search for truth and solutions to humankind’s 20th
century problems without being affected. She was so focused and disciplined. Her
efforts to understand, to communicate her passion for alternatives to violence,
and her sense of the essential role of spiritual growth made an impact and a
difference in the lives of those who knew her well. Her sparkling eyes and
articulate, assured voice advocating reason, compassion, and spiritual questing
are unforgettable to those of us who learned from her.

One of her students and later colleagues at LaVerne
College, California, Dr. Herbert Hogan, has said, “Perhaps she was as close to
being a saint as any of us will ever know.” That sort of observation has been
made by many who knew her. But she would never have claimed such a title for
herself. She was far too modest and self-effacing. Yet, like Saint Francis, she
made the world her family. The example of her love and care for her aging mother
and her newsletter networking which tied her former students and friends into
her circle of caring had all the tenderness and grace of a parent and true
servant of God the parent and God’s children. If a saint she was, it was
precisely in her lack of consciousness of her own saintliness or indeed of her
own significance. She witnessed to a better way and the love that knits the
universe together, providing hope that humankind, too, can bond someday in one
human family whose quarrels can be resolved without violence.

Manchester’s Peace Studies program has pioneered a way now
followed by over 200 institutions worldwide. We owe it to her vision and her
persuasiveness that such a model of faith, learning, and service should live
today and have had an influence in many settings through her students,
colleagues, and friends. Her work and influence have put North Manchester and
Manchester College on the world map, more widely known than many larger cities
and universities. If God’s peaceful city should ever come on earth, Gladdys Muir
has provided brick and mortar and has laid well a small part of the foundation.

The
Ku Klux Klan Activities In North Manchester
By Orpha Book

In response to a request for material on the activities of
the Ku Klux Klan in Indiana, and especially in North Manchester during the
1920s, I, as reference librarian at Manchester College, sent to the Indiana
State Library for material to assist a student in writing a term paper.

Several books which discussed the Klan and its activities
were loaned to us. One small, well-worn volume described the gathering of a huge
mob in North Manchester at the train depot awaiting the arrival of the Pope. The
paragraph concluded with the statement that the single passenger who alighted
from the train was a small, frightened wizard of a man who was forced to prove
he was not the Pope but who turned out to be a corset salesman.

I was a local teenager at the time, living in the country,
and was unaware of Klan activities in the town. Did such an event actually occur
in North Manchester? I have often wondered and have asked Dr. L.Z. Bunker and
Dr. Eldon Burke who was a Manchester College student in the 1920s, but neither
one could recall any such happening and doubted the truth of the account.

If any such a throng did ever descend upon North
Manchester, I thought that surely W.E. Billings, editor of the News-Journal,
would have recorded it. Since my retirement I have spent many hours perusing the
1920 microfilms of the News-Journal when the Klan was active in Indiana.
Following are excerpts from the paper and descriptions of some of the
activities.

February 15, 1923: Burned Cross Tuesday. “A burning cross
in the Oak Park addition west of the Vandalia track and north of Fourth Street
was the occasion for a fire alarm Tuesday night at 10 o’clock. The alarm was
given by Paul Stone whose attention was called to the fire by some people who
were at a Sunday School class party a couple of houses south of his home, they
calling to him as there was no telephone where the party was. No one seems to
know who erected the cross or set it on fire. Some say it was the Ku Klux Klan,
and others say it may have been imitators. Anyway, the general hope is expressed
that future celebrations of this kind will not be staged on quite as windy a
time as Tuesday, for sparks from the burning burlap were carried a long distance
and might have started serious fires. No one seems to care how many crosses are
burned, if other property is not endangered. The cross itself was probably 20
feet high with a cross arm of eight or ten feet long. It was made of 2x4 timber
padded with burlap that was wired in place and that was saturated with oil of
some kind. The cross was set in the ground and held upright by guy wires.”

March 15, 1923: Rev. Blair Talks for Klansmen. “A large
audience gathered at the Grand Army Hall Monday evening to hear the principles
of the Ku Klux Klan explained by Rev. Blair, a Christian minister from Atlanta,
Georgia. The meeting opened without any introduction. Mr. Blair simply stepped
to the platform and commenced to talk. He told of the early history of the Klan
in the South during the Reconstruction period after the Civil War when the
negroes, controlled by unscrupulous white men, were creating such terrorism.
After that emergency ceased to exist the Klan was inactive until seven years ago
when it was reorganized in Atlanta to combat existing evils in the U.S. today.
He claimed that the Klan was composed of American-born Protestant citizens and
that the Klan never took the law in its own hands, but that it obtained the
evidence and then turned the information to the proper authorities. To do that
the Klan today had the largest force of detectives employed of any organization
in the United States. He denied that the Klan was responsible for any mob
outrages or terrorism, claiming that when such acts occurred it was either
enemies of the Klan or unscrupulous individuals seeking to remain unknown by
using the Klan’s hooded regalia. It was the first public meeting that had been
held in North Manchester, although similar meetings have been held in Wabash.
Mr. Blair is a good speaker, is a minister of the Gospel, and is said to be a
graduate of one of the large eastern colleges.”

In another publication, the Manchester Herald, March 14,
1923, the crowd for the meeting described above was estimated to be 1500 who
came “to hear the unknown speaker who in a flow of the most brilliant speech
held the vast audience spellbound for two hours and 40 minutes.”

May 21, 1923: Klansmen Parade Streets Tuesday. “One of the
biggest crowds ever assembled in North Manchester came to town Tuesday night to
see the first parade of the Klansmen ever held in this city. All roads leading
to North Manchester were crowded with automobiles, and parking space was at a
premium…The parade was headed by three masked horsemen. Following those came an
automobile with a cross lighted by electricity, in which were three hooded men.
A large flag was carried by eight of the Klansmen, and this was followed by a
band, all members wearing the regalia of the organization. Then there were four
horsemen, and following them came 126 masked members making a total of 144
beside the band. Street crossings were patrolled during and some time before the
parade by hooded figures. It seems to be the belief that few if any local
members of the organization took part in the parade, the plan seeming to be to
leave that to the visiting organization.

“The headquarters were at the fairground, and after the
parade there were initiating ceremonies in the center field, while a large crowd
of spectators stood outside the racetrack. A big search light operated from the
judges stand made it possible for guards to see that none but those giving the
password or whatever sign was used went into the center field. The crowd
dispersed quickly after the parade, and for all the jam of machines there seemed
to have been no accident reported either in town or on the roads.”

September 10, 1923: Big Crowd at Klan Picnic. “There were
about 2500 people gathered for the Klan picnic at the fairground Sunday. A
considerable number of those were there for the picnic dinner, and a great many
more came in the afternoon for the speaking. There were addresses by Rev. Blair,
who has been speaking on Klan subjects in many parts of the state and who is an
able and capable speaker. There were also a talk by Rev. Ira Dawes of Wabash and
music by a Wabash band.

“The speakers talked from a stand erected in the racetrack
in front of the amphitheater. The crowd filled the amphitheater, and it was
estimated that there were fully as many more on the grounds as in the
amphitheater, which will seat about 1200. No displays or parades were made, it
being just a quiet meeting that seemed to be enjoyed by all present whether they
were Klansmen or not…”

October 11, 1923: Klan Parade Tuesday Night. “There was a
big crowd of people in town Tuesday night to witness the Klan parade. Before the
parade there was an address by a speaker said to be Rev. Parr from Wabash,
though no introduction was made. Following the address the parade of hooded men
came from the west, while at the east end of the street a cross was burned.
‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ was played by a band as the march went on. There
were between 140 and 150 hooded men in the parade. Following the parade the band
gave a number of good selections on the street.”

November 1, 1923. The following appeared on a one-page
political advertisement “published and paid for a citizens committee responsible
for the citizen ticket in the Town election. It was a protest against the Klan
movement because it is fundamentally wrong and detrimental to the peace,
prosperity and happiness of the Town.”

These are extracts from an article on the Ku Klux Klan,
entitled “The Patriotism of Hatred” by Rev. Lloyd C. Douglas, former pastor of
the Zion Lutheran Church in North Manchester.

“Almost overnight in many sections of our country, the
movement has achieved huge dimensions and, evolving from a mere handful of men
who for the most part were having their first experience as organizers, has
become at once a power.

“The printed statement of its faith reveals a handful of
principles to which practically every loyal American would agree, but the actual
motivation of the thing is Hate…

“Without doubt the chief hate of the Klan is directed
against the Catholics. Ever since I was a little boy, I have heard persistent
rumors, in every community I have lived in, to the effect that the Catholics are
getting ready to rise up and do something – nobody was quite sure what. The
cellar of the Catholic Church was stocked with rifles to be used when the right
time came, and the Knights of Columbus were secretly drilling in preparation for
the fateful day…

“The Klan is opposed to the Jew. This is no new experience
to the Jew. He has been the favorite target for the hate of every nation on
earth. That hate may easily be explained on the ground of jealousy. The Jew is
prosperous. The Jew starts with nothing and becomes a capitalist. No matter how
badly the Jew may feel over all the new hatred hurled against him, he will not
retaliate. It will simply set him to wondering what good Christianity is, in the
work, if this is where it all ends up. Whatever he may have thought about Christ
before, he may now doubt whether there is much salvation to be had for anybody
in a cross that burns with flames of hate!

“The Klan is against the foreigner in our midst. In his
printed creed, he tempers his attitude by the mere statement of his belief that
America is first for Americans – and others second… But if the Klansman thinks
he can teach the foreigner a larger respect for our American institutions by
pulling a pillow over his head and assembling, by night, with thousands of
others of his sort, to lay plans for the extra-legal pursuit of the foreigner’s
goat, it seems clear that the process provides its own defeat.

“Could there be a more serious problem than the predicament
into which the Klan has plunged us? It matters little whether the Catholic has
any ground for his bigotry, the Jew for his prejudice, the Italian for his
ignorance. The whole problem resides in the everlasting fact that no ills can be
cured by hate! That is good gospel. This is the message of the cross. And when a
lot of people, regardless of intent, collect around a wooden cross to stampede
one another into bitterness against persons who happened to have been born of
another race or in another country, it is the very last word of sacrilege…”

On August 24, 1924, there was a brief announcement of a
Klan meeting at the fairground at which a national speaker was to be present.
That was the last account found in the News-Journal of any significant activity
of the Ku Klux Klan in North Manchester.

Nowhere did I find reference to the huge crowd at the
railroad station waiting for the Pope. Perhaps the author of that story
embellished the account of the big Klan parade which occurred on May 21, 1923,
and drew a large crowd to the town.

Unfortunately the file folder containing all the references
we had gathered on the Klan to assist students with their term papers
“disappeared” from the college library so none of the stories or book titles can
be verified. But some day I just may take a trip to the Indiana State Library to
read again about that little old corset salesman, and not the Pope, who arrived
by train in North Manchester.

In the 1940’s wartime fear of spies caused townspeople to
call Paul when they saw suspicious foreigners, like the shabbily-dressed fellow
Lorin Werking found hiding in his haystack on October 6, 1941.Facing some 30 hostile farmers guarding him with rifles, rakes, and
pitchforks, the outsider may have been relieved when State Trooper Cliff Snyder
and Paul arrived to take him in for questioning.His lack of documents and erratic behavior prompted them to send his
photograph and fingerprints to the FBI to verify his claim of Austrian
citizenship.Noting that the man
not only seemed recently shaved and shorn but was wearing clean underwear
beneath his worn, dirty outer clothes, the
News-Journal suggested he might have
donned a hobo disguise to hide sabotage activities.Perhaps Mrs. Ray Keim recalled this warning when she called Paul to pick
up a suspicious foreigner claiming to be from Switzerland when he asked for a
handout at her door in 1942.

Like most small towns in the 1930’s and 1940’s, North
Manchester was plagued by window peepers.Buckshot and buckets of water discouraged some nocturnal voyeurs, but
recurring cases usually required police surveillance.One of Paul’s stakeouts in the late 1930’s had surprising consequences.On a chilly night, Paul’s sister, Mary Kreamer, bundled up to take a walk
in the neighborhood he had staked out for several nights.Catching sight of a shadowy figure, each sibling suspected the other was
up to no good and immediately started to run.Mary headed across a yard with Paul close on her heels.Just as she rounded a tree, Paul grabbed her, and she let out a shriek.They collapsed in laughter over this case of mistaken identity which
became a favorite family anecdote.

Townspeople frequently summoned Paul to settle family
problems.Some of these disputes
caused more property damage than bodily harm, however.One time he responded to a call reporting murderous marital mayhem and
arrived to find the couple reconciling in the middle of their kitchen which was
strewn and plastered with the contents and remnants of every jar, bottle, plate,
and pan with reach when the fight began.Forgetting the cause of their altercation, they berated Paul for invading
their privacy.

Paul’s job also involved him in more life-threatening
situations.For example, in April
1935, Paul tried to persuade Artee Witt to admit himself to the Marion Veteran’s
Hospital after the shell-shocked World War I veteran began threatening his
family and others.Since Paul had
no warrant to arrest Artee, he agreed to let him go home to clean up for the
trip.Artee disappeared, however,
before Mrs. Witt returned with commitment papers from Wabash.That evening Deputy Sheriff Farr and Paul finally found him aiming his
sawed off shotgun at them from the top of the stairs of a house on West Third
Street.After shot through the
shoulder by Farr, Artee lunged at him and Paul, breaking out the stairway light,
and they all tumbled down the stairs in the dark.Finally the subdued Artee was taken off to the Wabash jail before being
institutionalized.

More than once Paul’s mechanical expertise came in handy
during emergencies.In 1939 he and
Dr. [L.Z.] Bunker were called to a doctor’s office at 107 East Main where
hemorrhaging and shock had caused eight-year-old Virginia Dickerhoff to stop
breathing following a tonsillectomy.As Dr. Bunker worked on her, Paul rushed over to his garage for a tank of
oxygen, which he used in acetylene welding, and dragged it down the basement
recovery room.Improvising a mask
from the cupped hands and a hose, he and Dr. Bunker took turns administering
oxygen until she was out of danger several hours later.

Out on the roads and streets Paul had to spend more time
enforcing traffic laws as the number of vehicles increased.In 1938 Virgil Opperman showed the lighter side of this job by filming
Paul running after, catching, and ticketing Tom Peabody for “speeding” up Market
Street in his 1903 Oldsmobile.A
year later Lee Brubaker was not amused at the prospect of going to jail when he
could not pay the $6.00 which Justice of the Peace John Brunjes fined him for
riding his motorcycle on the sidewalk.Lee avoided the lockup however by working off his fine at $2.00 a day,
cleaning mortar off cement blocks Paul would use to construct the locker plant.The same year, when a drunken driver refused to pull over and stop east
of town. Paul stopped him with a bullet through his back tire.It was far easier to nab the drunk from Indianapolis who pulled into
Paul’s service station one evening in 1942, boasting that he was too drunk to
find his way out of town.

Since robbers rarely were so cooperative Paul had to track
them down.During the 1920’s and
1930’s chicken thieves kept him particularly busy.In 1938, after arresting one culprit driving to pick up his partner, Paul
concealed himself in the back seat and nabbed the other thief as he jumped into
the car with a chicken in his sack.
The next year he helped round up a gang of chicken and egg thieves through
matching the track of a worn tire to their leader’s car.

The rise of car ownership in the thirties was matched by an
increasing number of car thefts by big city and local gangs working in this
area.On June 3, 1935, the
News-Journal announced that Paul,
Sheriff Shoemaker, and his Deputy Farr had captured one professional car thief
named Frank Bruno, a.k.a. James Mareno, after cornering him in a stall of the
Berry’s barn near Laketon the previous night.Fortunately Bruno-Mareno had left his gun in the car.In some cases car thieves tried to burn the evidence, as two members of a
Fort Wayne gang did near Liberty Mills in 1938, but Paul got the State Police on
the scene before the culprits could get away.

Auto theft started Harry Singer on the road to a life of
crime which culminated in a sensational murder case which Paul helped to solve
in the summer of 1936.Paul
initially picked up Singer, Wesley Cauffman’s hired hand, as a suspect in the
Wabash holdup killing of Joseph Bryant.The plot thickened the next morning when Cauffman’s landlord called Paul
to report no one had seen the family since July 21.Paul went out to inspect the house and returned to ask Singer about the
traces of blood, gunshots, and burned clothing he had found.Singer denied any responsibility for them and insisted that the family
had moved away after asking him to sell their belongings and send them the
money.After Paul and Huntington
Detective Al Teusch took him out to walk around the farm, however, Singer
confessed to shooting Cauffman and his wife and beating their nine-year-old
daughter to death because they had been “mean” to him.Word of the murders spread fast, and a huge crowd gathered to watch the
exhumation of the bodies from the shed floor where Singer had buried them12 days earlier.At the
height of the investigation the
News-Journal observed that the town looked like the site of a reunion of
state and regional police officers.

By September 17 Singer had been tried, convicted, and
sentenced to death in the electric chair on December 26.A few days before his death he admitted having killed Joseph Bryant, too.Because he helped solve the case, Paul was invited to witness the
execution, the second one in Wabash County history.Ironically the previous case in 1855 also involved the murder of a family
and the theft of their property.
Oddly enough, only two years before Singer killed the Cauffmans, his mother and
uncle had been murdered by a man who later killed himself.After Singer’s execution his remaining family did not claim his body,
which ended up at the Indiana University Medical School.The story of the crime and Paul’s role in solving it was widely
publicized.In 1943 when Max was
stationed on the Galapagos Islands, a fellow airman asked if his dad were named
Paul and showed him True Detective’s
illustrated account of the crime.

A still-unsolved crime resulted in Paul’s only serious
injury suffered between his terms as town marshal.On December 5, 1944, he was working late in his office at the locker room
when Charles Goehler ran in to report a burglary in progress across the street
at the Bashore Feed Store, the present site of the fire department.While people tried in vain to contact Marshal Sheak and Night Officer
Lambert, Paul called the store’s manager, picked up his repeating .22 rifle and
went over to investigate, which he legally could do, having been deputized
following the burglary and fire at the Peabody factory the previous spring.Crouching behind a telephone pole in the alley in back of the store, Paul
fired warning shots which flushed the burglar out of the store.Retreating down the dark alley, he tossed a pipe bomb at Paul.Despite being knocked off balance, Paul managed to exchange gunfire with
the culprit.By the time local
officers arrived on the scene the burglar had escaped,and Jean Oppenheim had driven Paul to Dr. Bunker’s office to be treated
for a gunshot wound to his right arm.Fortunately the bullet had not hit the bone, as it entered below and
exited above his elbow, leaving a fairly clean wound except for some embedded
shirt fragments which my mother drew out with flaxseed poultice.Although the culprit’s identity was fairly well established from clues at
the scene of the crime and other evidence, for some still mysterious reason he
was never brought to trial, making this one of the few crimes Paul could not
resolve.

Years later people
still bring up this and other incidences connected with Paul’s years in the
community.So far, however, none of
us children has figured out the best response to “Your father arrested me once,”
a statement we frequently hear.
Sometimes people have given us new stories about Paul.Several years after Paul’s death, Russell Bolinger, former dean of
students at Manchester College, expressed his appreciation for Paul’s quick and
effective quelling of an incipient student riot during an early-1950’s panty
raid on Oakwood Hall.

Just a few years ago Dr. Bunker told me the following
story.In the early 1930’s she was
determined to improve working conditions for the grave diggers who suffered from
frostbite and pneumonia caused by shoveling frozen earth through the harshest
winter months.Reading that Notre
Dame had begun using a backhoe in its cemetery, she suggest to Clay Syler, a
town board member, that the town purchase one for Oaklawn.The budget was tight, but Paul managed to find a good second-hand one
that held up for some 30 years.In
fact it probably was used to dig Paul’s grave in 1965.

That year my college classmate, wrote to share a memory he
had overheard while lunching at The Grill on March 17, the day Paul died.The lunch crowd fell silent when Paul’s death was announced.Then Virginia Dickerhoff Heisler spoke
up, “If it wasn’t for Paul Hathaway,” she asserted, “I wouldn’t be here today.”After she finished telling how Paul and Dr. Bunker had saved her life
some 26 years earlier, others added their stories about Paul’s impact on the
community and on their lives.I
think that it was especially fitting that his memories were shared that day in
The Grill, a business and building Paul had constructed alongside his other
property in the heart of North Manchester, the town he had known and served in
so many roles since 1898.